[South] Korea's dream of putting its own satellite into orbit was halted during the final countdown, Wednesday, after engineers at the Naro Space Center gave the order to abort the launch due to unspecified technical problems possibly involving the rocket engine.

The country's space agency quickly ruled out a Thursday launch, and some experts say it might take several days, if not weeks, before the country's very first rocket actually gets off the ground.

Experts at the Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI) stopped the countdown of the Korea Space Launch Vehicle-1 (KSLV-1) with seven minutes and 56 seconds left after finding abnormal data during the automated sequence.

The exact nature of the problems wasn't available as of Wednesday evening, although KARI officials said that the trouble was likely related to controls in a high-pressure tank designed to regulate valves in the rocket. However, they refused to confirm where the tank was located.

KARI has now formed an investigation committee with Russia's Khrunichev State Space Science and Production Center, which is providing technology for the project.

A successful launch of the KSLV-1, which is carrying a 100-kilogram (220 pound) observation satellite, will make South Korea the tenth nation to place a spacecraft into orbit from its own soil.

According to the Korea Times citing a KARI engineer, the soonest a second launch attempt could come would be in three days.

KSLV-1 sits on the pad during ground tests earlier this year. Credit: KARI

Max Q

I know politics isn't the point of this forum but I wonder how the North will take the South launching a booster like that.

South Korea has rescheduled its first space rocket launch from its own territory for Aug. 25 after a technical glitch halted the countdown minutes before blastoff, the government said Friday.

The Ministry of Education, Science and Technology said the new date reflects weather conditions and time needed to prepare the Korea Space Launch Vehicle-1 (KSLV-1) and its scientific satellite for a safe launch.

"We have tentatively set the launch time for 5 p.m., Tuesday (Seoul Time), although this may be altered depending on various developments," said Vice Science and Technology Minister Kim Jung-hyun.

Using a smattering of Russian and domestic technology, South Korea launched a small rocket toward space Tuesday, but the booster's nine-minute flight apparently failed to inject its payload into orbit.

Korean media outlets immediately hailed the launch as a success, but officials grimly declared the flight suffered a failure a few hours later.

Moscow-based Khrunichev, the Russian space contractor that builds Proton rockets, provided the Korea Space Launch Vehicle's first stage. South Korea built the second stage and payload shroud.

South Korea launched a half-Russian, half-Korean rocket toward Earth orbit from the country's southern coast Thursday, but officials say they lost communications with the vehicle approximately two minutes after liftoff.

The Korea Space Launch Vehicle, or KSLV 1, blasted off from the Naro Space Center at 0801 GMT (4:01 a.m. EDT), or at 5:01 p.m. local time. The rocket flew through a nearly transparent deck of clouds about a minute after liftoff.

Live video from the space center showed no signs of any problems during the early moments of the launch, but officials with the Korea Aerospace Research Institute say they lost contact with the rocket 137 seconds into the flight.